We made a series of interviews between the end of 2011 and the beginning of 2012. These interviews persuaded us to complete a project we were thinking about for a long time: the setting up of a cards rotation system.

Right now there are 800 cards in the collection and it’s already too much for the game to run smoothly. The players who have all the cards always use the strongest of a clan and even if it makes them win matches they are frustrated not to see more variety. For their part, the beginners have to face a huge collection and they often feel quite lost.

We want to create a list that includes only characters released in the past two years (+ leaders and starter characters) and change several rooms which allow players to only use the characters in this list. We won’t impose this list in every rooms because our goal is not to stop you from playing the oldest cards, for example the DM T2 and Survivor T2 won’t change at all even if names will be different.

Let’s see what will happen in detail:

1/ Create a list of characters called «Standard» which will be updated every 6 months:
This list will contain Leaders, Starter Decks characters, all characters released within these last 2 years before the update (LD included) and characters which will be released after the update.
In practical terms it will give about ten characters allowed in each clan (with more or less the same number of characters in each level). Note that the new clans will keep all their characters. It will be taken into account in the cards releases planning. We will act as to give each clan what they need to be efficient.

3/ Finally, create or adapt battle rooms:
The Standard battle room : Standard Format with a DT every other hour.
Instead of opening a less than 26 stars (T1) room and a more than 26 stars (T2) one, you will have one single room BUT you’ll face opponents whose decks have a number of stars close to yours. This mechanism corresponds better to the reality of DTs today where every players try to find the good combination which will give the most points while winning matches with 20 to 30 stars decks. Merging the two rooms will allow you to keep this optimization spirit without the «artificial» side of the stars limitation. This flexibility combined with the Standard format will give a breath of fresh air to DTs while keeping specificity.

This room will be the ONLY DT room. There won’t be any T2, T1 or ELO Daily Tournament. We know that it’s not harmless and it was a very difficult decision to take. Some of you struggled a long time to obtain very expensive collectors which allow them to improve their results in DT and their disappointment is understandable. Nevertheless, DT’s today are clearly dominated by some decks not to say several highly efficient cards which is not healthy in a competitive game mode.

The ELO room: Standard format 25 (with potentially some bans), same rules except that there won’t be DTs in this room any more.
Use the Standard rules in the ELO mode sounds quite obvious to us. It will allow some regular changes to the mode and it will remove old characters which cause balancing problems. It should reduce the number of staff banned characters and no more characters banned by players.

About DT, we think that the ELO mode is pretty different from the DT. There is no reason to mix these two game modes. Today, ELO players have the opportunity to win free credits without playing in DT. Tomorrow they’ll have to choose between Dt and ELO which is already the case for players playing in other modes (Survivor or DM).

3 Deathmatch rooms:
Extended DM: Extended format, current DM rules.
Standard DM: Standard format, current DM rules.
Standard DM 25: Standard format 25, current DM rules.
The Extended DM will be equivalent to the current DM T2, only the name will change.
The Standard DM will allow players with big decks but with characters in the Standard list. The DM T1 will disappear and we’ll add a Standard 25 room. We noticed that the rare players in DM T1 were more ELO players than DT T1 players. We hope that the Standard DM 25 will be more used than the current DM T1 room. If it’s not the case, we will think about it. If there are DM T1 players here who are reading this message and Don’t want this change to Standard DM 25, Don’t hesitate to let us know.

Here we are, it was very long, sorry. I didn’t talk about all the details of these changes. There will be some small impacts in the Shop (with Standard packs), on the collection display or public presets which will be the normal result of the Standard release.

Don’t hesitate to tell us what you think about it on this thread. You can also send an email to Dr.Ido here: feedback@urban-rivals.com. He will read all your emails even if he won’t be able to answer to all.

One last word (well... several): with this change, we want to let those who like to play with all the cards in the collection keep on doing it. And at the same time we give the possibility to play with more recent cards in an evolving environment. We think it’s an important step for the game which will allow us to keep on making the game live through the release of new characters, new abilities, etc. without constantly facing the fact that there are too many cards in most clans.

I'll go out on a limb and say that I'm very pleased at the changes, and the potential benefits they can have on an already overtaxed Pack system playing havoc with the market economy. I appreciate the work this project must entail, and have already noticed many of the smaller details that must have been leading up to this (like the updated Character History on cards, showing more info than it used to).

That said, there are a lot of potential effects this can have on the relative value of cards, based on supply and demand, or, the _perceived_ supply and demand affecting potential market manipulation. Whereas it's completely unavoidable, and will stabilize in short order, I recognize there is no need for hysterical drama, and screaming cries of unfair practices. As an overall community, we will all gain or lose on a relatively equal basis.

I've already gotten several PMs on this topic this morning, due it seems to the post going public a day earlier in another language forum. Before any players start freaking out about other folks having a full day's head start on planning their market strategies, I can honestly say that I've scoured the market in great detail, and NOT seen any obvious jumps or manipulation in excess of what we've come to expect on a daily basis. That could change soon. Inevitably, that will change. But for right now, we ARE all on an equal footing. So let's keep the 'doom and gloom' prognostications to a minimum. We're all going to be extinct after Dec 21st, 2012 anyhow, right? ;-]

Wow, a lot to take on board there!!
Similar to LOA Daigon I also am looking forward to these changes as I think the game has stagnated and it needs a fresh impetus to encourage new players to join and keep playing without feeling completely overpowered.

Can I clarify whether Cr cards will be allowed in Deathmatch and Survivor but not in DT and ELO, correct?
Will Cr cards be given out as prizes still?
And finally, will any of the game timers change as in faster ELO or is it pretty much the same as now?
Thanks.

If I read it right, the ELO ("Standard 25&quot room will ONLY allow for Crs that were released (not retired) in the past 2 years. I don't think there are any, currently. (Caelus was closest, released on July 17th, 2009) So, no Cr cards in ELO, except possible new Crs in the future.

This should hold true for any "Standard" format, including DT and Survivor, but Crs should be available for all "Extended" format decks, if I read it right.

Since ELO will be available only in the standard format, good ELO cards released before 2 years are now useless. for example, Murray will plummet shortly (or already has), and cards like Ector are already in the ascendant.
Regarding market economy, God and Fraggle alone know what the long term holds store; but like Euzebe said, whatever is happening, it'll stabilise, that's for sure.
A lot of good people who have stored all their eggs in one place are gonna go broke.. oh then, what the hell, one can't have everything.
Apart from this, I am sure the new formats will breath a fresh life into this game in general, and though laborious, the new DT mode is perfect though it'll take a huge amount of computing power (but then people are buying packs not for songs, right? ). But then some of the Jackie Cr dependant DT players might die of coronaries, which can't be such a bad thing
And finally, like Daigon said, what are we bitchin about? Dec 21 is coming fast

I love the creativity in keeping things fresh with a rotating standard. I agree with Scorpion's sentiment regarding the DM T1 format. It would be great if DM T1 could remain an option for us. Of course, if you find that there aren't enough players to merit both rooms, it makes complete sense to only have one and we'll flex with the changes.

Kinda feels bad knowing the rich players won't be dominating in T1 anymore. I personally don't care, but I'm sure many of the players who religiously buy credits every two weeks (or more often) won't be very happy with this change. The only place they could now use their OP crs would be in fight club.

Or in T2 if I understand right, but only cards released within 2 years ago. TBH this is still all confusing . Still fairly sure the credit buying players will stop supporting this game, or if they continue to do so, not as much as they used to, and you'll lose profits. That's if I'm understanding that there will be no more "normal" t1 or T2 compatible rooms besides fight club.

"It should reduce the number of staff banned characters and no more characters banned by players."
Just be sure to instantly perm ban newly created OP cards like Spyke then.

Finally, I'm not understanding this sentence. "Tomorrow they’ll have to choose between Dt and ELO which is already the case for players playing in other modes (Survivor or DM)."

Is that "choice" only for players who wish to earn credits? If they play in one mode for the week, they can't play in the other until the next week? So confusing (I understand this was simply translated from the french forums and posted here)

Well, that ends Urban Rivals for me, if ELO is banning cards I have collected just because others cannot be bothered to save up for them it sucks. I dont have all cards but if you remove the old cards from Piranas I lose almost half my deck, which is already hurting from staff bans.

The Urban Rivals team is made by lovers of all kind of Collectibles Cards Games and Trading Cards Games like: Magic the Gathering, Dominion, Vampire, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pokemon, Wakfu TCG, Assassin Creed Recollection, Shadow Era, Kard Kombat and Might & Magic Duel of Champions.